A lot of Youtube channels are reporting declining viewership lately.
EX1: https://youtube.com/watch?v=cpVnx4_yqTo
EX2: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yF0tmhEtVJE
Fun times. Looks like a lot of channels are seeing a decline not just Linus. Hes just the latest to talk about it.
Then I saw this article as well and thought I would share.
Anyone here youtube creators? Are you seeing the same thing, a general downturn in viewership?
Everyone here is speculating about their content, but the simple answer is YouTube just changed how they count the view number. The change basically happened overnight, so it’s not some slow attrition of views. They said in the WAN Show that while the view count halved, the number of likes hasn’t changed (the view/like ratio doubled), and the revenue they earned hasn’t changed (CPM doubled). All of this points that the same number of humans are watching, but what counts as a view in the “views” number just changed.
Folks here are missing the point blaming LTT for the drop. This has been a sudden drop, too sudden to be fatigue or audience tastes changing.
Also I can see the same on my own channel. About 2 weeks ago views suddenly dropped to a third of the usual views. And even high performing videos have had trouble getting views since. Even videos with a high impression percentage are getting lower than average views.
The same wsd also reported by Second Wind (old Zero Punctuation) and their experience is the same: way too sudden drop to be anything else except YouTube adjusting their algorithm.
Thanks for the analysis. I’ve got to say. We on Lemmy can be vicious.
Yeah, it’s easy to bark at influencer we don’t like.
I think his org has consistently done its best and I still tune in across the channels. I know that I couldn’t do better with matched resources, without experience and a lot more considerations.
Listening to everyone hate on a whole media group puzzles me a bit.
LTT has done bad things and never apologized. For example he copied a gamersnexus script and never acknowledged it.
Never acknowledged it? He immediately put a pinned comment attributing Gamers Nexus when notified of it, and GN thanked him for it, which any reasonable person would take as him being happy with the resolution.
It was a piece of info from GN’s video, not a copied script though.
Yeah, that’s what I’m basing what I said on. You can see GN thanking Linus for quick action, and being understanding that an inexperienced writer could make such a mistake.
And stole an item to auction off! I can’t believe people here defend their ass D:
Which turned out to be false, and Billet Labs confirmed it was always the agreement that they were not supposed to return it, they just changed their mind later when it was already too late.
The email chain was published by Billet Labs after LTT said there were no expectations of returning the prototype. It proved that Linus lied about it.
The same wsd also reported by Second Wind (old Zero Punctuation) and their experience is the same: way too sudden drop to be anything else except YouTube adjusting their algorithm.
In their video, Yahtzee said it could be related to Restricted Mode on youtube suddenly turns on by itself. Or at least that’s their hypothesis, since they checked that if that mode is on, a lot of their videos vanished from their channel.
They’re wrong, my channel has under 4% viewers in the up to 18 year segment, this effect is way bigger than if I lost then completely. Also my channel features no swearing or inappropriate content so, it should not affect it at all if this was the case.
It’s not about what your viewers are, it’s about what youtube now automatically hides by default. They show it in the video.
Yes, but even if they hid everything I have from teens and suspended teens, the drop would be way less. And that’s why I think they are wrong about the reason for the drop.
Tierzoos theory is because formats that were good for the past years (8-10 min videos) are less popular now with the advent of shorts. And people are watching yt on their TVs now.
Demographics are also changing. Wish there were more actual data. Other than the very end result which is views down over many channels all at once.
That also wouldn’t have a drastic immediate effect. On the long term this is likely to eat some views of long form content.
I wonder what they’re going to prioritize now
I‘ve noticed the algorithm drizzles a good portion of smaller creators on my front page in recent months and that part is growing. I am talking about videos with just a few thousand or few hundred views that make up roughly 10-15 percent of my recommendations or so.
I think Youtube is diversifying exposure so you don‘t see the same faces you‘ve seen the past 15 years as often and new channels get a chance to grow. I am guessing Youtube doesn‘t want to be too dependent on the same huge channels anymore either.
Of course that means huge creators are calling to the pitch forks and torches because they lose revenue but why should I care? Most of them are rich anyway and don‘t necessarily produce better videos than someone with their phone in their garage workshop or a bunch of college students in their dorms. If anything it feels more like the old Youtube again.
There is a lot wrong with Youtube but I couldn‘t care less about huge channels being forced to slim down or try harder.
Noticed those as well.
Usually the side bar recommends the usual bunch or related content but then there is this totally random video of some small channel with 10 maybe <1000 views doing a let’s play or some random content which is completely unrelated to the content I watching at the moment.Most of them are rich anyway and don‘t necessarily produce better videos than someone with their phone in their garage workshop or a bunch of college students in their dorms. If anything it feels more like the old Youtube again.
In the case of LTT: Not everyone can absorb the cash flow for an ULTIMATE PETABYTE MULTI-NODE STORAGE SERVER BUILD.
I honestly enjoy those as uneducated as some videos are, those infrastructure videos are really enjoyable for the amount of jank.I’m noticing a lot more ai generated videos myself. Or at least they look like it. Its kinda slop.
I’ve been getting recommendations for videos with 2 to 10 views. Noticed it about three months ago.
Same. I kinda like it.
mr beast has always been shady asf, thats why hes desperate as in the type of content he puts out, eventhough he has huge a base and his shitty food company. Like he wants to make a big deal out "paying the " wrestler that got knocked out by an aggressive MMA person. hes like a vulture.
AI slop most likely. Well, to be serious, I think the drop is due to them trying to fight AI slop and miserably failing.
yes, ive seen an increase in AI slop + propaganda too, and yt also is allow ISRAEL to make pro-IDF propaganda to flood the site now. 45million$ contract from NETANYAHU.
AI slop trailers, AI bizarre animal injures, GOOGLE veo AI videos.
Nazi salutes and brotein supplements
I hope anything but LTT, a shit clickbait channel that steals things to auction off
If a change in the algorithm hurts, it may be a sign that the algorithm had been helping previously. No one questions the algorithm when viewership grows, but it’s largely to blame for the good and the bad.
True, but a platform where your income is dependent on an ever changing algorithm is not something a business can handle. Changes like that will drive away major channels and make them start to look for alternatives.
I mean you just described every website in the world, and their relationship with Google search engine traffic. Demonstrably, a business can deal with this. An algorithm can inject uncertainty into a business, but if one is entirely and exclusively dependent on one algorithm, is it really a business?
Very true. And it’s very worrying that so much of global online business is literally dependent of Googles good will.
DarkviperAU also mentioned it.
I’ll echo that I have felt an algorithm change. I watch a lot of leather crafting videos and a lot of Adam Savage videos. In the past week I’ve been getting Adam Savage working on leather videos and I’ve been thrilled to discover these. As someone who’s been watching both Adam Savage and leather crafting videos for months or maybe years, I should have already seen these, but somehow missed these until this past week. Now YouTube shows me video after video of Adam Savage working on leather, which I love.
youtube is probably gearing the algorithim for other content than influencers that draws in more views or revenue.
Not impossible. The best revenue for Google would be if they could ai generate all the content themselves.
He generates far too much content without any depth, and it’s all infotainment.
What I’ve noticed is YouTube recommending me more obscure videos, from very small creators.
I very much appreciate whatever they’re doing, regardless of how these bigger channels are being hit by it. Yesterday I got recommended a video by an elderly woman, showing a mug warmer she bought. It was very sweet, had less than 30 views and it was a lovely contrast to the flashy, over edited videos stretching a paragraph to 10+ minutes.
Not saying the big channels are bad, I just personally like the small time channels and appreciate that YouTube has been (at least with the algorithm it has set for me) giving these small channels a shot at getting an audience.
I’ve connected with a lot of people from smaller channels, joined communities etc. yet this is much more difficult with the larger ones (in some I’ve been to, over the years, the chatrooms they set up are so huge the moderation sometimes just gives up or doesn’t even exist in any practical way).Google is now expecting users to watch ads that are sometimes a full 25% of the viewing time, or slowing access and requiring logins when adblock is being used. And even if you wade through all that, watching Youtube tech and info videos has become a lot like looking at online recipes. The majority of what you find is fluff and filler for only small amounts of useful content.
I used to go to Youtube daily for research and entertainment but now I avoid the site completely whenever possible. It seems we’ve finally reached an enshittification tipping point.
It’s about time.
I stopped watching LTT years ago. His channel is crap. He’s a tech personality who seems to barely understand technology, so most of his videos are just over the top bullshit and stunts. Not to mention his awful annoying vocal fry. He’s like the male Fran Drescher.
Plus, Linus has been a complete asshole to GamersNexus, one of the best channels for investigative journalism in tech. As far as I’m concerned, Linus is your typical business entity, and lacking ethics.
It’s not about Linus specifically. Many other channels (with actual good content) have been experiencing the same. Creators are assuming it has to do with restricted mode, but I’m not sure it’s convincing, it probably has more to do with algorithmic changes youtube has made.
Google is making users/consumers not want to use/consume google things by making those things more difficult, more invasive, less user friendly to use/consume.
That’s it. That’s all.
If I just want to watch a clip that I could before but now I have to sign in because it thinks I’m a not, NO
If it wants me to watch ads for things I’ll never buy and actually forces me to, NO.
If it kills the front ends I prefer to use, or kills the ability to watch via proxy, for my privacy and/or security. NO.
If it feeds me Nazi shit without clicking a single link on a new install on a new browser with no profile on a new IP, fucking NO.
Probably doesn’t help that a bunch of the decent channels were bought by private equity and are now churning out boring, safe and uninteresting content.
https://youtu.be/hJ-rRXWhElI (a yt link, lol).
A brief summary from https://www.dailydot.com/news/youtube-channel-private-equity/
Some channels like Donut Media, Veritasium, and Task and Purpose have been acquired publicly. Others, such as Dude Perfect and Coco Melon, have been acquired more privately, with no public disclosure.
Plenty others. A key giveaway is when a channel diverges their risk. When the front man who is the reason you have watched the channel suddenly has co-hosts and large segments from other channels in their regular content.
Because people wont stay 14 to 16 year olds for long
I used to watch LTT all the time. I stopped watching some years back after he installed a six figure Wi-Fi system on his “estate.” I had enjoyed watching a relatable everyman review computer hardware, and more often than not break things. I didn’t sign up to watch a millionaire dick around with exotic tech in his McMansion.
Doesn’t help he has actually gotten dumber over the years.
He very clearly has fallen out of touch and basically is just a personality at this point.
So your not even watching a tech enthusiast millionaire dick around with things.
Your just watching a rich white dude dick around with tech and his company.
I always hated his "oh no i hope i don’t drop this expensive thing that you peasants can hardly afford… Oh i dropped it’ schtick. People cheered him on like aome village idiot. At some point he said he feels like he’s pushing expensive unnecessary stuff to people who can hardly afford it and he wants to stop doing it. But he never did. He’s doing tech reviews and i assume a podcast, because everyone has a podcast, and his studio is ABSURD. I watched some other video where they needed something from the LTT studio and they even commented on how fucking big his operation is. He had rooms there he didn’t even know existed. I stick to the opinion that he’s just a slimy rick man, nothing else.
last i heard his company is worth 10+million, yea hes definitely just sitting back and not really advancing his channel/.
It’s a business with over 100 employees, if it wasn’t huge where would the employees be? His dropping thing always existed, he just got rich in the meantime.
Would it be any better if he’s black?
Why racially profile if it doesnt matter?Edit: I like how I am getting downvoted for asking why the mentioned skin color is of any importance.
If a dude or dudette is a rich asshole it doesnt matter if they are yellow, white, black or green. Asshole stays asshole.His skin colour is maybe mentioned, because being white rich male is peak privileged, although also being a governor somewhere or having a seat in government would be even better
sounds like he got Lazy and just let his, lower- level plebs manage the channels where he just comes in and “promote” product and leaves kind of person. i was subscribed to another channel that did that, they just wanted to “not be present” while channel is declining because its still doing well, now its not doing well(they had several issue arise that caused it.)
I just wired my house for Ethernet for a a few thousand dollars of electrician time. It’s multiple times faster than any WiFi can be. Why would anyone drop $100k on wifi??
Oh dude. The next drop. DIY it. It’s easier than you think. Even the cheap keystone punch tools will get the job done.
I’ve done it. It’s not the wire crimping I paid for, it’s the crawling around under the house and in the attic to route the runs.
As I recall, he installed a top of the line commercial grade system in his house and surrounding property for the lols.
I’m sure declining viewers has nothing to do with the various controversies such as auctioning off prototypes, rushed reviews with misleading or false conclusions, mistreating staff etc. Channels like Gamers Nexus really laid into him.
YouTube is hostile to viewers unless you pay them £20 a month.
It’s like 15 ads per 2 mins screen time with 2 being unstoppable and 1 being 3 minutes long. Slightly exaggerated but not far from the truth. It’s horrible. And they slow everything down too, the main video fake buffers whereas when you’re in premium it doesn’t.
I didn’t mind paying a fiver but had to do it via the moon to get it cheap but now they have stopped that.
They are using automatic dubbing by default here in France! I was horrified the first time.
After some time it “learns” you don’t want it.
But what grinds my gears instead are auto-translated video titles.
Because I am watching maybe 70-80% english content I decided the lesser evil is to just set the language to english instead.
Annoying as fuck but managable.Because I am watching maybe 70-80% english content I decided the lesser evil is to just set the language to english instead.
Google has always made it extremely clear that they don’t believe it’s possible for the human brain to know more than one language, and that anyone who claims to know more than one is a liar and a witch and has no place in their platforms.
It horrifies me as a German. They also get titles, descriptions and comments wrong all the time. It legitimately doesn’t work.
I hate them for auto translating the video titles and descriptions with no way to turn them off, I even installed an extension to restore the original titles but YT broke it again intentionally or unintentionally with their unending tweaks.
This honestly doesn’t surprise me, because English proficiency in France is below that of Spain, Russia and even Italy, which says a lot.
That’s because the french media industry is very strong, and virtually everything is dubbed.
for Android (TV): smart tube next
For a browser (Firefox): ublock origin.
Have not seen an ad in years, and i have not paid a cent to youtube.
For anyone following the smart tube next tutorial on github you don’t need to do anything after installing the “kutt.it/…” Download. You do not need to transfer an APK from your phone or computer. Literally just download the downloader, and type the beta or stable package address and install, also make sure you have developer options enabled beforehand.
Also, probably a great time to turn updates to your OS off, as Google is taking away the ability to sideload (well, kinda). It’s a whole story. Highly doubt that SmartTube Next is gonna get a licence to allow signing of their app.
How do I do that on my android tv?
Settings > devices prefs > about > turn auto update off
And God forbid you enable captions on the video or something - it’ll disable itself every time an ad plays.
How do I turn that feature on?
I keep turning off captions off, and every few days they are automatically turned back on.
“That’s the neat part: Fuck you >:(”
- Youtubeyou can force a lot of options still when you upload a video OR provide a link. Plenty do that. For example in the tags add yt:cc=on will force on captions when you play a video
Yep agreed.
It’s downright disgusting to browse youtube without premium or an adblocker.Sadly I need premium simply because I am watching on an Android TV and I am not trusting third party clients with my google account.
Too much stuff is associated with it (monetary)Or you use adblock
I would but I primarily watch on my tv
get SmartTube Next if it’s an android TV
Sadly not. Apple TV
ah. i have the same issue on my iphone. I just don’t watch youtube on my iphone because fuck ads.
Get the ublock origin lite and on for safari, had worked an absolute treat for stopping YouTube ads on my iPad.
Another tip; Orion, the browser developed by Kagi can install proper Firefox extensions. You can have the real full uBlock Origin extension in the browser.
Edit: I believe it can handle Chromium extensions as well but who cares about those?
aha thanks. I just installed it, and no ads!
deleted by creator
I only pay them because I watch a stupid amount of YouTube. Hours a day, many more hours when not working.
If those ads come back while I’m paying though, the flag flies.
On broadcast TV, a 30 minute timeslot had only 23 minutes of actual content and 7 minutes of ads.
That’s what we’re heading back to. 20% of the watch time is ads.
And then there is the occasional 30 minute to an hour infomercial that comes on obvious stuff people watch to go to sleep! I wanted someone softly talking about outer spacey things, not you’re shitty product I give so much little of a fuck about that I didn’t even look at what was being advertised. I hate you so much I will not even remember your name to give you free advertising by birding about you online!
I have premium through a page that makes family groups and you pay a lot less. From time to time there is an issue with the group and you spend like two days without premium until it is fixed.
During those periods YT is unwatchable and I skip using it until the issue is fixed
Those stupid thumbnails pushed me away
Maybe at some point we can all stop watching and hence supporting YouTube, that’d be nice.
